John Capps has signed up for his third term as chairman of the Infiniti National Dealer Advisory Board. He mildly protested the encore but says something draws him to the brand.

At his Plaza Motor Co. in St. Louis, a single complex that sells nine luxury brands, Capps maintains his offices in the Infiniti store. "It's a franchise I have a lot of passion about," says Capps, who was in the first wave of Infiniti dealers to open in 1989. "It was a little bit of an underdog for a while, and I guess we all love the underdog. It's been interesting to watch them reach the potential that they have." He spoke with Staff Reporter Lindsay Chappell.

Infiniti ran an aggressive lease program in the fourth quarter. Did it help?

It did. Despite not really having any new product, Infiniti has really performed better than most of its luxury competitors. The exception probably would be Audi. When you consider the decline the industry has seen, Audi was off the least amount of the luxury brands, followed by Infiniti and Mercedes. So the fact that we've performed well without a lot of new product is due to Infiniti's effort to be very aggressive with their marketing and their incentives.

But the EX was new.

Yes, we got the EX, but I'd be less than honest if I said it was a home run. It hasn't been a great seller.

What was the problem with the EX?

Well, it's a wonderful product. It drives beautifully and it's well-appointed. But it has a very limited back seat area. So by virtue of that, it became more of a niche vehicle.

The G37 convertible will arrive this year. How will that perform, given the depressed market?

We're all very excited about that car. It's going to hit the market in spring, which is perfect. It's a beautiful car. We think that'll add some incremental volume. If you look at Mercedes-Benz, Lexus and BMW, they have their core vehicles, and then they have all these wonderful little niche models that provide good gross. They aren't giant-volume products, but they help the franchise get from selling 100,000 to 120,000 cars a year to selling 200,000 to 250,000. We're looking for that same sort of benefit with the Infiniti franchise over the next three or four years.

What else are you looking forward to?

The replacement cars we've been able to see look really great. There's a new M coming. There's also a new QX. They're tweaking a few other cars, and in 2010 there's a hybrid.

Where does the decision stand on bringing back the Q45 sedan?

I don't think there's a decision on what we'd consider a flagship vehicle at this point.

Do you expect to hear something soon?

I sense that they were closer to making a decision on it probably six months ago. With what's going on in the economy right now, I assume they're regrouping and looking at it.

They've been asking our thoughts about prioritizing new product. And at one time, a number of years ago, we were keen on getting a flagship model for the franchise. We still are, but it's not our top priority today. Our top priority is to get deeper into the near-luxury segment with another entry. That's the biggest-volume segment within our luxury business, with about 600,000 units sold last year.

But that's G35 territory, isn't it?

Yes, but our G represents less than 8 percent of that segment. A number of brands have more than one entry in the segment.

So we're asking Infiniti for a whole new model in that segment, along with derivatives.

What other priorities have you expressed to the factory?

Our second one would be the luxury crossover segment, which is where we currently play with our EX and FX. I'd characterize both of those as niche models. We don't have a core model in that segment, and we really need one. Look at what the RX has done for Lexus. It brings in volume, profit and good retention, and we just don't have that. The FX and EX are both good cars, but they'll never deliver the volume that a core volume will bring.

What would this core model have that the FX doesn't?

You could call it a car that will appeal to the soccer moms. So it's going to have to have something that's got some size, some style and some luxury. The people in that segment are looking for utility. You have to have the ability to carry young adults in a second row. The Mercedes-Benz M model has done well with that. BMW has done it with the X5.

You are involved in so many franchises — Mercedes, BMW, Lexus. Where is Infiniti's place in that galaxy?

That's a very good question. Infiniti has always said that its goal is to become a Tier 1 luxury manufacturer, along with Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Lexus. Nobody else has quite made it to that category yet, based on sales volume and the number of models. Some of those franchises will have anywhere from 18 to 39 models or derivatives.

Infiniti really is out there with less than 10, so it's difficult to compete from a volume perspective. c